With the rising cost of living, even on the African poverty line, and
the greed and demand for bush meat, ivory and rhino horn, the threat
to African wildlife is very real and growing strongly. The threat to
some species is so great that they may become extinct within the next
few years.
Poaching is the illegal killing of animals, usually to eat or sell.
Poaching is an enormous problem in Africa and other parts of the world.
Many more wild animals are disappearing year after year, and poaching
is one of the main contributing factors. There has been an ivory ban
since 1989, with the exception of “one off” sales of confiscated ivory
as happened in October 2008 (the first since 1999). This may allow poached
elephant tusks to be mingled into the legal sales. Poaching can have
various effects, the most direct and destroying is extinction, either
globally or within a given locality or country. Poaching has also been
associated with the spread of disease, both in animals and humans.

Reasons for Poaching

All poaching is caused by the desire for profit of some kind. The difference
is the scale of profit.

Poaching Types

There are three distinct types of poaching:

Subsistence poaching – for bottom line profit of food
and basic survival

Trophy poaching– for mid to high level profit

Speculative poaching – for vast profit

Subsistence Poachers
Take animals mainly for food, or to sell the animal either as a whole
or in parts such as skins, tails, teeth etc. for a small amount of money
in order to buy food. They are driven by poverty and hunger. This group
of poachers mainly set out to trap smaller animals - a wide variety
of insect species, rodents, birds, small-to-medium antelope such as
duikers, gazelle, impala, dik-diks and bushbuck and larger antelope
such as lesser and greater kudu, eland also warthog and other small
and medium sized mammals such as porcupines and bush pigs. Avoiding
this kind of poaching is impossible and the scale of these activities
is not strongly impacting in the wildlife biodiversity.

Trophy Poachers
Aim to gain profit through trading in endangered species. They are driven
by sheer greed. Both speculative and trophy poaching exist because there
is a worldwide demand for the products. This demand is caused by lack
of education amongst the buyers. All forms of poaching continue to exist
because there is an inadequate preventative law against poaching and
an inadequate program to control poaching.
These trophy poachers are mainly targeting endangered species such as
white rhino and the critically endangered black rhino, elephant, cheetah,
lion, leopards, zebra, antelope and any other rare and endangered species
of mammal, reptiles, and birds. Because of the money involved this kind
of poaching is very aggressive on the wildlife biodiversity and is also
creating a lot of threats to the local guards, park wardens and game
rangers.

Speculative Poachers
This group use poaching as a money-making venture. They are driven not
by the need to survive– but by a desire for financial gain. They work
on a smaller scale to the large organised poachers syndicates. Speculative
poachers tend to target most of the species that are hunted by subsistence
poachers and also, larger species - right through to animals such as
the cape buffalo, white and black rhino and elephants. This kind of
poaching is very aggressive on the wildlife biodiversity and is also
creating a lot of threats to the local guards, park wardens and game
rangers.

There are two different speculative poaching:
1. killing animals and selling part of them.
2. Killing animals to protect valuable like livestock and crops.

Sometimes these poaching squads are heavily armed, trained and with
no fear of legislation, ethics and anti poaching units. The poaching
syndicates are foraged by people that are the top end of the scale and
are sometime high profile people. A recent example of this occurred
in South Africa where a Vietnamese diplomat was recalled after she was
filmed in an apparent illegal purchase of a rhinoceros horn. It was
filmed by a television team following government investigators, they
filmed a gang of apparent poachers meeting the woman and handing the
rhino horn to her. She was then filmed taking the rhino horn inside
the Vietnamese embassy in Pretoria in South Africa. It is said that
Vietnamese and other eastern and far eastern regions are heavily involved
in the illegal trade of rhino horns through syndicates.

Targeted Animals from Speculative Poachers.

Rhinos, elephants, lions and leopards are targeted animals. Our flagship
animal is the rhino, the specie that suffered incredible rise in number
of poaching:

Methods of poaching

There are various different methods of killing the animals
these include:

shooting sometimes by heavily armed poachers

bow and arrow

spears

pitfalls

net traps

snares

dogs

poison, although this used this is mainly
used on birds

In order to stop all this a group of professional security operators
and experts in African nature fields have joint and created the Poaching
Prevention Academy. Our goal is to stop poachers and in order to do
this we have created a 3 phases strategy. The first of 3 will be discussed
in this web site.
Training local units in order to create a strong deterrenvy action against
poaching syndicates. Our Poaching Prevention Training focuses on SUT
– Small Unit Tactics.

Our trainers background are strongly linked
to conservation and to professional tactical training. The course will
cover the following criteria and subjects:

First Aid – from basic to trauma

Field craft -Camouflage and concealment. Living
and working in the field.

Patrolling - Strategy in relation to locating,
apprehending, arresting and processing of suspects.

Background in status, ecology, behaviour and habitats
of the reserve wildlife.

Survey and monitoring techniques for priority and
threatened species.

Live drills and force on force techniques.

Vehicle searching.

Manning of gates.

General security.

Techniques of navigation in the field – Acquiring
your position using Global Positioning System, use of a compass
and map and accurate position plotting and reporting.

Survival - Living in the field, finding shelter,
food and water.

Finding your way using Celestial navigation and use
of the sun.

Course day-by-day outline:

Day 1/2:
Basic field first aid, the use of the tourniquet and Israeli bandage to
stop blood loss associated with gunshot wounds.

Day 3/4:
Equipment explanation including use of webbing and where magazines,
first aid equipment and none vital goods should be placed in the webbing.
How to hold and move with a semi automatic/full automatic rifle/shotgun.
Basic movements with rifles – kneeling, moving, looking left and looking
right.
Different modes of carrying the rifle depending on the state of alert.
Weapons Safety.Day 5:
Practice of movements learnt on day 3 and 4, plus learning how to go
to ground and to roll left and right with rifles as well as looking
back and forward from lying position.
Lots and lots of practice of all movements learnt from day 3 and 4.
Individual shooting drills, involving movement and shooting from different
positions.
Weapons Safety

Day 6:
Repetition of movement drills from day 3 to day 5.
Shooting drills again on an individual basis focused on running and
taking cover and shooting from lying, kneeling and standing position.
Patrols were done in teams of two practicing movements.

Day 7:
Short repetition of movements learnt through days 3 to 6.
Focus on day 7 is how to react after a contact is made. Focus on two
movements, the first being offensive and the second being defensive.
Moving as a team off two with live fire.
Basic hand signals were learnt.

Day 8:
How to search a vehicle.
Arrest techniques were covered as well as securing the arrested.
Hand to Hand combat.

We have been working in different African countries such as South Africa,
Namibia, Zambia and Kenya. We are currently involved in the training
and support of 6 Anti Poaching Units.